Articles

This article presents the findings of a study of selected religious and secular non-governmental organisations (NGOs) working on HIV/AIDS in Nigeria. The study sought to identify whether, and in what circumstances, so-called faith-based organisations (FBOs) have distinctive characteristics with respect to their goals, values, organisational characteristics, and activities, compared to secular NGOs. It found that the FBOs studied are perceived by their staff, beneficiaries, and local observers as possessing some distinctive features and comparative advantages relative to secular NGOs.

This paper takes stock of current thinking about the nature and distinctiveness of faith-based organisations (FBOs) in development. Since the 1990s, public policy-linked scholarship from the USA has sought to define and categorise FBOs. More recently, many donors have increasingly chosen to work with and fund such organisations, giving rise to discussions about how FBOs working in development should be defined and classified, and how their contribution to development should be assessed.

This paper explores the hypothesis that Islamic religious values and beliefs are antithetical to women's education in two cities in Pakistan: Lahore, generally believed to be a socially liberal city, and Peshawar, often regarded as the bastion of conservative values and norms. Leaders and members of selected religious organisations, and some members of women's rights and development organisations, were interviewed to ascertain their views.

This article outlines one of the activities organised by an international Evangelical faith-based development organisation (FBDO) working in the Kibera informal settlement, an area that attracts large numbers of development practitioners, including FBDOs and Christian missionaries. Some Pentecostal and Evangelical perceptions of entrepreneurship are outlined, which are then related to current theoretical descriptions of the role of global Pentecostalism in improving livelihoods and well-being.

This paper argues that discussion of religion and development sees religion in over-institutionalised ways and is biased towards Christianity over other traditions. It explores this through analysis of the World Bank-sponsored study, Voices of the Poor, and the authors' own research in India. This shows that religious identities and practice can be quite fluid, especially amongst people in lower castes. People identify religion not just in terms of particular affiliations, but in relation to an underlying moral order.

In mainstream development thinking, policy, and practice, religion has generally been neglected, despite its pervasiveness and importance. As a result, analysts puzzle over how best to study the complex links between religion and development. The framework outlined in this paper addresses the question – how can the presence, nature, and activities of religious people and organisations be better understood, so that they can be taken into account in development activities?

The articles contained in this issue present a panorama of good protective intentions gone awry. International or national policies presumed to benefit children appeared in field research to be ineffective or counterproductive for the children. Depending on the situation, the problem could primarily be one of poor interpretation or implementation of a child protection policy. This is a management issue, which can be resolved by competent governance. National governments and international development programmes know how to handle such issues; the question is one of will and priority.

Following the American-led invasion of Iraq, thousands of Iraqis fled to Jordan and the international donor community initiated humanitarian assistance. Through a unique partnership, three organisations conducted participatory research with Iraqi children and their families in Amman. The goal was to understand children's lived experiences – their challenges and coping strategies – with a specific focus on child protection. A better understanding of local context had an immediate, positive impact on organisations and their effectiveness, but long-term change proved elusive.

Drawing on empirical data from a community-based study with children and adults in rural Peru, the paper analyses the everyday experiences of a conditional cash transfer programme, called ‘Juntos’. The findings show that social protection programmes like Juntos address certain child vulnerabilities by making eligibility for their cash transfers conditional on behaviour-related to child protection-related such as health check-ups and school attendance.

Traditional approaches to protecting children are insufficient to meet the complex issues they now face, and inter-sectoral, child-centred strategies are needed. Addressing this, the International Institute for Child Rights and Development (IICRD) developed the Circle of Rights (COR), a participatory action research approach to involve children in ‘bottom-up’ protection work. This paper describes COR in Thailand through the Child Protection Partnership (CPP), a project focused on ICT child protection.